The New York Times
Blinken, without leaving home, tries to repair fences with allies abroad
WASHINGTON – Secretary of State Antony Blinken started his first month in office with an explosion of diplomacy. As part of his effort to reinvigorate American alliances eroded by the Trump years, Blinken spoke to dozens of his colleagues around the world and joined Asian and European leaders – all without ever leaving his seventh-floor office at the State Department. While the world struggles to control the coronavirus pandemic, most diplomatic travel remains delayed. In normal times, Blinken would have hosted a flow of visitors and recorded thousands of air miles so far; instead, he relied on phone and video screens, like zoom-dependent workers everywhere. Sign the New York Times newsletter The Morning “It’s a good thing that we are on a family basis here at the State Department, otherwise we would be broke,” Blinken told NPR this month. Behind the jokes, however, there is frustration. Blinken and President Joe Biden say the United States faces a Herculean challenge to restore ties with important allies, restore American leadership against rivals like China and Russia and face threats like climate change and a nuclear Iran. Although Blinken was vaccinated against the coronavirus, State Department officials say they are being cautious about their trip abroad, which involves an entourage of advisers, security personnel, support staff and journalists, many of whom are at risk of contracting or spread the virus. Blinken currently has no planned trip, and a senior government official said he may not catch the air before the end of March – although even that schedule is uncertain. This, say former government officials and diplomacy experts, is an undeniable disadvantage, especially at such a time in the world. Many deals can be done through phone calls and videoconferences. But diplomats say that proximity creates a familiarity that cannot be replicated, fueled by body language, eye contact and handshakes, shared meals, cultural events, exchange of gifts and the serendipity of meetings in corridors, outdoor walks and other moments away from neurotics and scheduled helpers. Blinken was, for example, unable to make a personal appearance at the annual Munich Security Conference, a forum organized almost last week for American and European elites to speak, exchange ideas, strategize and affirm transatlantic titles. On Monday, he made a video call with EU foreign ministers. In normal times, these events may have been “part of a comprehensive trip through Europe to include the Munich Security Conference and a trip to NATO,” said Cathryn Clüver Ashbrook, executive director of the Future Diplomacy Project at the Belfer Center for Science at Harvard University and International Affairs. Missing events in person “is a missed opportunity in this moment of reinvigoration for transatlantic relations in particular,” she said, not least because of the many parallel meetings that take place around the Munich event. “You think of all the pictures of the summits, where the leaders are leaning over each other,” said Clüver Ashbrook. “This is where the real details are resolved.” The current stagnation is remarkable compared to Blinken’s predecessor, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who, along with other senior officials from the State Department and the White House during the Trump administration, slowed down his travels during the pandemic. But this travel agenda was part of a general business ethos as always regarding the virus criticized by health experts and in no way interrupted the trips, which came with predictable results. After returning from meetings in London and Paris in October, for example, Pompeo’s director of policy planning tested positive for the coronavirus, aggravating the allies for its potential exposure. The beginning of the management of a chief diplomat is typically a time for particularly ambitious travel. When Hillary Clinton became Secretary of State in January 2009, after the Iraq War and President George W. Bush’s “cowboy diplomacy”, she also felt that the United States urgently needed to replant diplomatic seeds worldwide . In mid-February, Clinton was flying to Japan, China, South Korea and Indonesia. A few weeks later, she visited the Middle East before attending a summit of NATO foreign ministers in Brussels in early March, then met with Russia’s foreign minister in Geneva before heading to Turkey. In early April, Clinton visited 15 countries, in addition to Ramallah, in the West Bank. It is not just Blinken who is grounded, but his broader team. (Biden also has no plans to travel abroad soon, says the White House.) Climate envoy John Kerry, a former secretary of state known for his unlimited appetite for travel abroad, has not yet left the country and has not specific plans to make then. The same goes for Blinken’s envoy to Iran, Robert Malley, who otherwise would probably be traveling between Europe and the Middle East to confer with allies. In contrast, President Barack Obama’s special envoys, including some to the Middle East, Afghanistan and Pakistan, hit the road almost immediately in 2009. One exception is the State Department’s envoy to war-torn Yemen, Timothy A. Lenderking , which left on Monday for its second trip to the Persian Gulf region in search of a peace agreement with Yemen. In a reminder of the complications of the COVID-era voyage, he underwent a mandatory quarantine period after returning from his last trip to the Gulf this month. A senior official said Lenderking’s travels were justified by the urgency of relief for Yemen’s humanitarian disaster and because he did not need a large entourage. State Department officials say that while it may not be ideal, there are benefits to virtual diplomacy. When Blinken spoke by phone last week to the foreign ministers of Australia, India and Japan – who together with the United States form what is known as Quad, a group implicitly aligned with China – he was able to connect with dozens of thousands of miles away without disturbing travel time and jet lag. “Of course, it is always better to be face to face with your foreign colleagues. Nobody wants to live in this world permanently, ”said Nicholas Burns, a former undersecretary of state and NATO ambassador. But, he added, “it’s easier. You can do a lot more in a short time than before. Burns said the Biden team suffered little from staying home; he argued that Biden and Blinken’s first public comments had signaled a clear break with the Trump era and a return to vigorous multilateral diplomacy. As much as employers are reconsidering whether their employees can work from home more regularly after the pandemic, Burns suggested that diplomats may see a new appeal to travel time savings and the challenge of coordinating schedules. “I think video domes will remain an option in the future,” he said. But there are other pitfalls. Journalists will protest the move to virtual meetings that do not offer the same opportunity for questions that many high-level diplomatic meetings offer. And then there’s the question of keeping video calls secure. In April, Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson tweeted the image of a Zoom meeting he chaired. People were quick to notice that the image included the meeting ID, potentially allowing uninvited guests to enter. While senior officials like Blinken and Biden rely on much safer methods than Zoom, they would be wrong to be complacent, noted Clüver Ashbrook. “We just launched the biggest hack in American history with Solar Winds,” she said. “That should give us a break.” This article was originally published in The New York Times. © 2021 The New York Times Company